UC-NRLF 


U3| 


HDH 


The  Scientific  Study  of  Infant 
Intelligence 


A    LECTURE 


BY 


HENRY  T.  BLAKE 


THE    SCIENTIFIC    STUDY    OF 
INFANT    INTELLIGENCE 


A.    LECTURE 

BY 

HENRY   T.    BLAKE 


Copyright  1902 

by 

THE  TUTTLE,  MOREHOUSE  &  TAYLOR  COMPANY 
New  Haven,  Conn. 


343 


PRELUDE 


THE  VERSATILE  BABY. 

Dramatis  Persona. 
Ma,  the  baby's  mother. 
Pa,  the  baby's  father. 
Baby,  the  boy  himself. 
Chorus,  sisters,  cousins,  aunts,  grandma. 

Ma—  Come,  Baby,  show  these  people  here 
How  very  smart  you  are. 
Call  Pa. 

Baby— Ba  !  ba  !  Bopup. 

Chorus — Precious  heart, 

How  very  smart. 

Pa — Now,  darling,  sing  that  pitty  song, 
"  Baa  !  baa  !  black  sheep,"  for  pa. 
Baa !  baa ! 

Baby—Tte, !  ba  !  Bopup. 

Chorus — Well,  I  declare. 

What  genius  rare  ! 

Ma— And  now,  my  precious  little  one, 
Say  by  by  to  papa. 
Ta-ta. 

Baby—'B&\  ba!  Bopup. 

Chorus. 

O,  wonderful !  magnificent !  his  like  was  never  seen  ; 
A  most  precocious  youth  is  this  whose  weeks  are  but  eighteen. 
To  say  so  much,  and;  pke-to  say.  ib  alt  so  very  plain  ! 
His  equal  ne'er  has  been  before, -'nor  Iwill  be  e'er  again. 
Upon  his  natal  day  the, Fatss,- in,  union  must*  have  smiled, 
For  nothing  else'could  ksfrfe  -prodiieed^s©  Versatile  a  child. 

[Curtain.] 

(From  Harper's  Magazine.) 


LECTURE 


LADIES  AND  GENTLEMEN: 

One  of  the  most  cheering  indications  connected  with  the 
scientific  progress  of  the  present  day,  is  an  awakening  interest 
in  the  character  and  habits  of  various  classes  of  our  fellow 
beings  who  have  hitherto  been  deemed  worthy  of  little  or  no 
consideration.  Influenced  by  this  humane  tendency,  a  number 
of  European  philosophers  and  savants,  for  a  period  of  years 
extending  back  as  far  as  1856  and  even  earlier,  have  devoted 
profound  attention  to  the  growth  of  mind  in  infants,  especially 
their  own ;  and  have  given  to  an  admiring  world  accounts  and 
results  of  experiments  and  observations  made  in  their  respec- 
tive nurseries.  The  important,  nay,  startling  discoveries  they 
made  as  to  the  hitherto  unsuspected  intelligence  of  European 
babies,  at  length  attracted  notice  on  this  side  of  the  ocean  also, 
and  Brother  Jonathan's  patriotic  emulation  was  speedily 
aroused.  At  the  annual  meeting  of  The  American  Social 
Science  Association  in  1881  public  attention  was  called  by  the 
Department  of  Education  to  the  notorious  apathy  with  which 
parents  have  been  accustomed  to  view  the  intellectual  achieve- 
ments and  mental  development  of  their  offspring.  A  most 
interesting  and  valuable  report  on  the  subject  was  made  by 
the  Department,  which  report  with  accompanying  documents 
was  published  in  January,  1882,  for  popular  instruction  and 
use.  Its  importance  as  the  first  step  toward  inaugurating  a 
new  era  in  human  progress  may  be  inferred  from  a  statement 
made  by  the  chairman  of  that  department  in  his  opening 
address :  He  actually  declares  that  "  the  secretary  has  devised 
a  plan  by  which  to  interest  the  mother  in  her  child's  growth  "; 

[This  Lecture  was  given  in  March,  1889,  in  "  The  Mechanics'  Course"  of 
the  Sheffield  Scientific  School  of  Yale  University,  and  some  months  later 
before  "The  Scientific  Society  of  Bridgeport,  Conn." — It  is  now  printed  by 
request  of  friends,  some  of  whom  have  recently  attained  to  parental  or 
grand-parental  dignity  and  who  desire  to  have  in  permanent  form  all  the 
light  which  science  affords  to  guide  them  in  their  new  responsibilities.] 

3.12659 


.VL;  :        — 4— 

and  he  buoyantly  adds  that  "one  intelligent  woman  who  is 
interested  in  this  subject  will  kindle  an  interest  which  will 
spread  throughout  an  entire  town"  The  noble  plan  which  is 
thus  proposed  to  remedy  that  glaring  evil  of  maternal  indiffer- 
ence which  has  hitherto  weighed  like  an  incubus  on  the 
infant's  progress,  is  happily  most  simple  and  effective.  It  is 
merely  that  parents  shall  hereafter  daily  and  hourly  register 
in  a  volume  suitably  prepared  all  of  the  baby's  good  and  evil 
actions — its  brilliant  and  stupid  utterances  and  achievements, 
and  its  mental  and  physical  outgoings  and  shortcomings.  That 
the  parent  shall  in  fact  open  a  set  of  books,  and  keep  a  running 
account  with  every  baby  produced,  in  which  its  intellectual 
debits  and  credits  shall  be  carefully  entered  and  posted,  so  that 
an  exact  balance  of  its  mental  and  moral  value  may  be  ascer- 
tained at  any  given  instant.  "  The  importance  (so  reads  the 
Report)  of  making  some  systematic  effort  to  record  the  devel- 
opment of  infant  life  has  occupied  the  thoughts  of  many  peo- 
ple in  various  countries  for  a  long  period.  This  Department 
has  undertaken  the  difficult  task  of  collecting  statistics,  and  has 
issued  circulars  in  the  form  of  a  register  for  such  statistics." 
A  copy  of  the  register  in  blank  form  is  appended  to  the  paper 
and  a  number  of  parental  reports  based  upon  it  which  were 
received  during  the  previous  year  are  printed,  revealing  the 
mental  development  of  various  babies  under  the  scientific 
rather  than  pet  designations  of  "Case  A,"  "Case  B,"  etc.,  to  which 
more  particular  reference  will  be  made  hereafter.  A  letter  to 
the  secretary  is  also  published  from  Dr.  Darwin  expressing  his 
interest  in  the  proposed  investigations  into  the  mental  and 
bodily  development  of  infants.  "  Very  little,"  he  mournfully 
remarks,  "  is  at  present  accurately  known  on  this  subject ;  and 
I  believe  that  isolated  observations  will  add  but  little  to  our 
knowledge ;  whereas  tabulated  results  from  a  very  large  num- 
ber of  observations  systematically  made,  would  throw  much 
light  on  the  sequence  and  period  of  development  of  the  several 
faculties."  We  heartily  respond  to  these  inspiring  words  of 
Dr.  Darwin,  and  cordially  recommend  the  free  use  of  the 
registers.  No  family  can  afford  to  be  without  them,  and  it 
would  even  be  well  for  those  without  infants  to  keep  a  liberal 
supply  on  hand  for  use  in  case  of  accident  or  unexpected  emer- 


—5— 

gencies.  Children  cry  for  them  ;  and  when  these  mental  and 
moral  inventories  shall  have  been  fully  filled  up,  and  duly  veri- 
fied under  oath,  we  would  earnestly  advocate  the  tabulation  of 
the  infants  also  according  to  their  respective  merits ;  and  then 
would  even  go  so  far  as  to  recommend — out  of  compliment  to 
Dr.  Darwin— the  survival  of  the  fittest ! 

The  work  thus  laid  out  for  parents  in  this  country  by  the 
Social  Science  Association  eight  years  ago  does  not  appear  to 
have  since  borne  the  fruit  that  might  have  been  reasonably 
expected.  Mothers  and  fathers,  and  even  grandparents,  have 
been  backward  in  coming  forward  to  obtain  the  registers.  The 
"  one  intelligent  woman "  who  was  to  feel  an  interest  in  the 
subject,  and  to  "  spread  it  through  an  entire  town,"  has  yet  to 
be  discovered ;  and  it  is  partly  in  the  hope  that  she  may  be 
found  in  this  audience  that  I  have  consented  to  address  you 
this  evening.  For  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  principal  hope 
of  science  for  progress  in  this  beneficent  work  rests  on  the 
female  sex.  A  baby,  as  is  well  known,  is  in  every  well  regu- 
lated family,  so  far  as  its  father  is  concerned,  a  pitiable  and 
neglected  object.  Its  advent  is  welcomed  by  him  with  no  gen- 
erous enthusiasm.  Its  physical  beauties  are  unobserved ;  its 
mental  precocities  are  ignored  or  depreciated;  and  its  vocal 
and  linguistic  performances,  instead  of  exciting  emotions  of 
delight  and  pride,  have  too  often  only  served  to  stimulate  the 
paternal  wrath  and  profanity.  Even  Dr.  Franklin  with  all  his 
breadth  of  intellect  and  sound  practical  sense  despairingly 
exclaimed  :  "  What  is  the  use  of  a  baby  ? "  and  rather  than  try 
to  solve  such  a  hopeless  problem  preferred  to  expose  himself 
to  the  imminent  risk  of  being  struck  by  lightning.  Unfor- 
tunately Dr.  Franklin's  aversion  to  this  branch  of  scientific 
inquiry  has  been  too  widely  shared  by  fathers  who  have  been 
more  favored  than  he  with  opportunities  to  pursue  it.  The 
average  paterfamilias,  when  aroused  from  the  ragged  edge  of 
an  uneasy  slumber  by  the  howling  of  his  infant  cherub,  rarely 
trims  the  lamp  of  science  in  a  calm,  philosophic  mood,  or  will- 
ingly expends  any  midnight  oil  except  that  of  castor  or  goose 
grease.  J^or  will  he  on  such  occasions,  if  he  can  help  it,  stand 
long  in  his  airy  garb  coolly  to  investigate  the  true  inwardness 
of  the  infant's  mental  organism  or  to  record  impartially  the 


bottom  facts  of  its  physical  phenomena.  May  we  not  hope, 
that  when  the  registers  shall  have  come  into  general  use  in  the 
nursery,  this  reproach  of  paternal  indifference  and  wasted 
opportunity  will  exist  no  longer  ?  We  may  at  least  congratu- 
late ourselves  that  science,  which  has  achieved  so  great  results 
in  utilizing  refuse  like  coal  tar,  street  sweepings  and  sewerage, 
has  now  taken  up  the  baby  with  almost  equal  prospects  of  suc- 
cessful results.  And  surely  no  more  auspicious  time  could 
occur  than  now  for  that  much  needed  intelligent  woman  to 
arise  and  paint  the  town  red,  when  even  our  national  admin- 
istration installed  in  the  White  House  submits  to  the  paramount 
sway  of  Baby  McKee. 

As  we  have  already  seen,  the  art  of  recording  the  steps  of 
mental  progress  in  infants  had  not  been  entirely  unknown  even 
before  the  registers  were  invented  in  1882.  Among  the  more 
important  publications  which  had  appeared  up  to  that  time, 
containing  carefully  kept  diaries  of  the  vocal  and  mental 
accomplishments  of  different  babies,  were  papers  by  the  dis- 
tinguished M.  Hyppolite  Taine,  by  Professor  Darwin  and  by 
Frederick  Pollock  and  others.  Also  a  French  work  by  M. 
Bernard  Perez  which  was  last  year  translated  into  English 
under  the  title  of  "The  first  three  years  of  Childhood" — and 
a  lecture  on  "  Psychogenesis "  by  Professor  Preyer  of  Jena, 
since  developed  into  two  good-sized  volumes,  English  trans- 
lations of  which  have  been  published  very  recently.  It  is 
worthy  of  notice  that  all  these  investigators,  when  they  began 
to  write  on  the  subject,  had  just  been  blessed  with  their  first-born 
offspring.  By  a  curious  coincidence  they  had  also  just  awaked 
to  the  fact  so  strongly  presented  by  the  American  Association 
Report,  that  the  psychology  of  babies  had  not  attracted  a  fail- 
share  of  attention  on  the  part  of  their  parents,  grandparents, 
sisters,  cousins  or  aunts,  and  that  the  great  need  of  the  times 
is  to  do  justice  to  their  extraordinary  intellectual  merits.  By 
a  singular  and  most  happy  circumstance  it  also  occurred,  as  is 
plain  to  the  most  casual  reader,  that  the  particular  infants  with 
which  these  authors  were  severally  specially  concerned  were 
most  favorable  subjects  of  investigation,  by  reason  of  being 
among  the  brightest  and  best  of  infants  which — up  to  that  time 
—had  ever  been  born.  M.  Taine,  it  is  true,  says  in  a  depre- 


— 7— 

eating  way,  that  his  u  subject "  was  "  a  little  girl  whose  mental 
development  took  the  ordinary  course,  being  neither  precocious 
nor  the  reverse "  :  but  it  is  only  too  evident  that  in  this  cau- 
tious language  he  either  underestimates  or  deliberately  under- 
states the  brilliant  qualities  of  his  offspring — and  it  is  hardly 
credible  that  so  intelligent  an  observer  as  M.  Taine  could 
have  been  unconscious  of  the  fact,  however  parental  modesty 
may  have  struggled  to  conceal  his  convictions.  The  records 
of  M.  Perez  concerning  infant  development  are  much  more 
general.  They  relate  with  scientific  impartiality  the  acts  of 
numerous  infant  prodigies  besides  his  own,  and  are  especially 
full  in  celebrating  those  of  a  certain  infant  phenomenon  whom 
he  calls  "  Young  Tiedemann,"  and  who  we  learn  "  was  the 
son  of  Tiedemann,  a  philosopher  of  the  18th  century."  The 
father  of  this  young  gentleman,  it  appears,  kept  a  diary  of  the 
infant's  doings  a  hundred  years  ago,  and  the  first  recorded 
indication  of  his  genius  is  that  "  On  the  first  day  after  his 
birth,  he  would  when  inspiring  suck  anything  put  into  his 
mouth."  A  still  stronger  corroboration  of  his  philosophic 
parentage  appears  in  the  fact  (if  it  is  a  fact)  that  "  at  five  days' 
old  he  appeared  to  laugh  without  any  particular  motive,"  but 
this  statement  staggers  the  credulity  of  M.  Perez,  as  it  makes 
him  out,  to  use  his  own  language,  "  altogether  too  remarkably 
precocious."  Notwithstanding  M.  Perez's  caution  in  accept- 
ing this  and  other  stories  of  this  infant's  precocity,  he  narrates 
many  about  which  he  evidently  has  no  doubt ;  fortunately  he 
is  careful  always  to  refer  to  the  hero  of  them  as  "Young 
Tiedemann,"  lest  his  readers  might  suspect  that  in  a  moment 
of  forgetfulness  he  was  relating  some  intellectual  feat  of  "Old 
Tiedemann,"  though  indeed  some  of  them  would  be  hardly 
credible  even  of  a  philosopher  of  the  18th  century.  Thus  we 
are  gravely  assured  and  expected  to  believe  that  "Young 
Tiedemann,"  before  he  was  13  days'  old,  would  "  reject  dif- 
ferent medicines  after  having  tasted  them  several  times,"  and 
his  philosophic  progenitor  is  unable  to  account  for  so  singular  a 
proceeding  except  upon  the  theory  that  "  he  distinguished 
them  from  his  food  by  their  sineU."  At  the  age  of  four 
months  this  sense  of  smell  had  become  so  acute  that  when  he 
saw  anyone  else  taking  a  drink,  "  he  would  twist  his  mouth  as 


if  he  were  himself  tasting  something."  Bnt  the  most  remark- 
able proof  of  his  discernment  was  given  at  the  age  of  13 
months,  when  he  collected  a  number  of  cabbage  stalks  and  set 
them  up  in  a  group  to  represent  his  father  and  associate  phil- 
osophers of  the  18th  century.  Upon  this  achievement  M. 
Perez  exclaims  with  admiration  that  "the  future  savant"  must 
have  been  "  exceptionally  gifted  with  precocious  talents !  " 
One  more  instance  of  the  intellectual  precocity  of  this  won- 
derful youth  must  suffice.  It  is  recorded  that  at  the  age  of 
four  months  lacking  three  days  "  Young  Tiedernann  tried  for 
amusement  to  make  all  sorts  of  movements  and  to  take  dif- 
ferent postures.''  The  importance  of  this  circumstance,  as 
Captain  Cuttle  would  observe,  "  lies  in  the  bearings  of  it." 
That  Young  Tiedemann  had  at  an  earlier  age  been  accustomed 
"  to  make  all  sorts  of  movements  and  to  take  different  pos- 
tures "  is  more  than  likely  :  but  it  was  at  the  exact  age  of  four 
months  lacking  three  days  that  he  tried  to  do  it  for  amuse- 
ment. From  the  fact  that  he  only  tried,  the  inference  is 
strong  that  his  pleasantry  was  not  appreciated  and  that  he  was 
promptly  sat  down  on,  at  least  in  a  figurative  sense,  by  his 
more  serious-minded  guardians. 

Though  this  performance  of  young  Tiedemann  breaks  the 
record  of  infantile  agility  as  an  expression  of  amusement,  yet 
similar  demonstrations  have  been  known  at  even  an  earlier  age 
from  other  intellectual  motives.  M.  Perez  himself  refers  to  a 
"  little  boy  "  whose  name  is  not  given  but  which  it  would  have 
been  agreeable  to  know  (not  necessarily  for  publication,  but 
simply  as  a  guaranty  of  good  faith),  who  on  the  second  day  of  his 
life  when  dressed  "  gesticulated  in  a  manner  painful  to  see  and 
especially  when  his  arms  were  put  into  the  sleeves."  Whether 
this  preference  for  the  absence  of  clothing  was  due  to  ambi- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  young  man  to  take  part  in  a  boat  race, 
or  whether  it  arose  from  a  general  masculine  indifference  to 
the  subject  of  dress  is  uncertain,  but  it  is  worth  while  to  con- 
trast it  with  the  early  development  of  feminine  interest  in  the 
opposite  direction.  Thus  we  learn  from  Prof.  Preyer  that  a 
little  girl  only  14  days  old  "  gazed  with  surprise  "  at  the  fash- 
ionable hat  of  a  lady  who  approached  her.  The  statement  has 
an  air  of  probability,  except  that  "  surprise "  seems  rather  a 


mild  word  for  the  emotions  which  an  intelligent  child,  at  least 
of  the  present  day,  would  naturally  display  at  first  sight  of 
such  an  extraordinary  object.  Another  little  girl  "  3-|  months 
old  "  could  not  only  indicate  where  her  feet  were  but  also  dis- 
tinguished her  dress  which  she  seemed  to  take  for  a  part  of 
her  person,"  and  who  furthermore  showed  "  a  strong  passion 
for  colorT  So  early  a  chromatic  infatuation  is  rare  in  the 
recorded  cases,  but  Dr.  Alcott  assures  us  that  it  was  sur- 
passed in  the  case  of  his  eldest  daughter,  who  uon  the  10th 
day  after  her  birth,  had  her  attention  arrested  by  the  con- 
trasted colors  of  her  mother's  dress,  and  her  attention  was 
accompanied  by  a  smile"  We  are  not  informed  whether  the 
smile  was  one  of  approval  or  derision,  or  whether  it  was  one 
of  those  unmeaning,  non-committal  smiles  which  M.  Perez 
declares  "  often  occurs  before  the  age  of  a  month."  He  adds, 
"  children  of  two  months  laugh,  but  without  seeming  to  know 
that  the  laugh  expresses  anything."  Dr.  Darwin,  however, 
repels  this  sweeping  charge  of  idiotic  cachinnation,  and  while 
admitting  that  his  first  infant  did  not  truly  smile  till  45  days 
old,  declares  that  at  a  little  over  three  months  he  laughed  with 
a  keen  appreciation  of  humor  and  suggestively  adds,  "  we 
should  remember  how  early  puppies  and  kittens  begin  to  play." 
The  question  how  early  infants  begin  to  smile  is  a  burning  one 
among  the  various  investigators,  who  differ  widely  in  their 
conclusions.  The  truth  is  that  the  correctness  of  their  obser- 
vations is  often  open  to  doubt,  since  very  many  demonstrations 
which  these  eminent  but  inexperienced  male  philosophers  took 
for  smiles,  would  probably  have  been  pronounced  by  any  prac- 
tical female  nurse  to  be  "  nothing  but  wind."  We  are  not  so 
skeptical  on  this  point,  however,  with  reference  to  the  smiling 
of  Case  E,  reported  in  the  Social  Science  pamphlet.  This  case 
was  composed  of  two  boys  "  both  of  whom,"  it  is  stated,  u  were 
born  in  Connecticut,  together  with  their  parents."  Such  a 
complex  form  of  contemporaneous  birth  is  very  unusual  in 
Connecticut,  and  infants  with  so  happy  an  experience  both  as 
to  the  locality  and  the  circumstances  of  their  origin  might  be 
expected  to  show  a  special  degree  of  cheerfulness.  We  are 
therefore  not  greatly  staggered  to  learn  that  Case  E,  No.  1,  at 
eight  weeks  "tries  to  smile,"  while  Case  E,  No.  2,  "at  eight 
2 


— 10 — 

weeks  smiles  beautifully."  So  confident  is  the  happy  mother  of 
the  correctness  of  her  observations  that  she  declares  that  she  had 
"  prepared  a  circular  on  the  subject  to  forward  to  her  Vassar 
friends " — but  why  to  them  is  not  very  apparent.  But  not- 
withstanding a  few  exceptional  cases,  the  melancholy  fact 
seems  clearly  established  that  babies  not  born  in  Connecticut 
do  not  smile  at  a  very  early  age.  Indeed,  MM.  Perez  and 
Taine  declare,  and  other  writers  generally  agree  with  them, 
that  "  agreeable  sensations  are  not  manifested  before  the  age 
of  two  months."  "While  we  fear  that  this  accords  with  the 
ordinary  experience,  we  confess  that  we  cannot,  in  looking 
through  the  records,  discover  any  good  reason  why  agreeable 
sensations  should  have  been  manifested  by  the  infants  reported 
on,  considering  the  experiments  to  which  they  were  subjected. 
Thus  we  learn  that  "  passing  the  feather  of  a  quill  over  the 
eyes  and  nose  of  a  child  15  days  old,  made  it  frown."  The 
nurse  of  Case  C  reports  that  she  "  could  wash  through  his 
eyes,  or  throw  water  in  them,  without  his  closing  them.  Tap- 
ping him  all  around  the  eye  within  half  an  inch  of  it,  he  does 
not  move  till  the  taps  reach  the  nose  near  the  inner  angle, 
when  he  partially  winks."  Shaking  the  fist  in  the  infant's 
face,  tickling  the  soles  of  his  feet,  "  rattling  pasteboard  boxes 
containing  comfits  "  close  to  its  ear,  sneezing  suddenly  and 
violently,  and  making  unexpected  hideous  noises  "  resembling  a 
loud  snore,"  are  all  specified  as  excellent  experiments  to  call 
forth  the  expression  of  agreeable  sensations.  The  blank 
"  registers "  suggest  a  still  better  one  by  requesting  informa- 
tion of  the  earliest  age  at  which  the  child  first  notices  the  prick 
of  a  pin ;  to  answer  which  inquiry  of  course  requires  an  inces- 
sant prodding  with  that  implement  from  the  moment  of  its 
birth.  Possibly  this  last  test  or  something  similar  not  yet 
devised  may  be  successful  in  proving  the  infant  susceptible  to 
emotions  of  pleasure,  but  for  the  present  it  seems  to  be  agreed 
that  even  with  every  encouragement  of  this  kind  he  don't  fully 
know  how  to  enjoy  himself. 

A  partial  compensation  for  this  unhappy  condition  is  sought 
for  by  some  philosophers  in  the  theory  that  as  a  general  rule 
babies  suffer  little  discomfort  from  things  that  are  disagreeable. 
As  a  remarkable  illustration  of  this  tempering  of  the  wind  to 


— II — 


the  shorn  lamb,  it  has  been  asserted  that  infants  are  nearly  or 
quite  insensible  to  bad  smells :  which,  if  true,  is  a  very  fortu- 
nate circumstance  for  the  baby.  Whether  this  insensibility 
ever  exists  or  not,  and  if  so,  when  it  disappears  has  been  a  sub- 
ject of  some  discussion.  M.  Perez,  who  was  a  very  careful 
observer,  seems  to  incline  to  the  total  insensibility  view,  while 
most  other  writers  agree  that  babies  make  odorous  comparisons 
even  at  a  very  early  age.  The  most  interesting  experiments 
on  this  point  are  those  made  by  a  German  savant,  an  indefati- 
gable, merciless  tester  of  baby  sensibilities  of  all  sorts,  bearing 
the  amiable  name  of  Kussmauler,  of  whom  more  will  be 
said  hereafter.  This  ingenious  person  smeared  infants  with 
asaf  cetida,  petroleum,  DippePs  oil  and  other  pungent  and  odorous 
liquids,  and  by  this  means  conclusively  proved  that  a  baby's 
smelling  instinct  may  be  developed  cent  per  cent.  Professor 
Preyer  tried  more  agreeable  perfumes  upon  his  child  with  much 
more  limited  success.  u  In  the  15th  month  freshly  ground  coffee 
and  cologne  water  held  under  his  nose  made  no  impression  at 
all  till  the  end  of  the  month,  by  which  time  the  cologne  water 
u  made  him  laugh."  It  was  not,  he  says,  till  the  end  of  18 
months  that  "  genuine  snuffing,"  by  which  he  means  smelling 
in  a  really  scientific  way,  was  manifested.  It  is  possible,  how- 
ever, that  Professor  Preyer's  child  was  peculiarly  unsusceptible 
to  the  sensation  of  smell  on  account  of  what  he  calls  "the  sur- 
prising immobility  of  its  nose." — "  which  rarely  moved/'  he 
says,  "  before  the  end  of  the  7th  month."  What  particular 
acrobatic  feats  the  professor  expected  the  infant's  nose  to  per- 
form before  the  7th  month  it  is  hard  to  say,  but  by  the  end  of 
that  time  it  seems  to  have  become  more  agile  or  more  appre- 
ciative, for  the  professor  records  that  it  would  then  "  turn  up  " 
significantly  at  his  approach.  From  this  fact  it  would  appear 
that  there  are  cases  in  which  a  wise  child  nose  its  own  father, 
and  also  has  a  decided  opinion  about  him. 

It  would  seem  from  this  significant  gesture  of  Professor 
Preyer's  infant  that  even  a  baby's  tolerance  of  disagreeable 
things  can  have  a  limit.  Indeed,  there  are  other  indications 
on  record  to  the  same  effect.  M.  Perez  speaks  of  a  child  11 
months  old  which  showed  a  marked  aversion  for  "  a  little  bark- 
ing black  dog,  also  for  the  rod  that  he  was  whipped  with  [at 


— 12 — 


11  months]  and  a  syringe."  As  an  illustration  of  the  sym- 
pathy which  infants  feel  for  others,  he  tells  us  of  a  French 
child  16  months  old  who  burst  into  tears  on  seeing  his  father 
take  a  shower  bath.  The  cause  in  this  case  might  seem  inade- 
quate to  the  effect  but  for  the  explanation  by  M.  Perez  that  the 
old  gentleman  was  washing  himself  by  advice  of  a  physician,  so 
that  the  sight  must  have  been  to  the  child  quite  rare  and  unex- 
plainable.  Possibly  the  operation  effected  such  a  complete 
change  in  the  patient's  appearance  that  he  became  unrecog- 
nizable, or  the  parent  may  have  vigorously  manifested  his 
own  discomfort  in  the  unaccustomed  ablutionary  experience. 
At  all  events  he  declared  to  M.  Perez  that  he  was  finally  "  obliged 
to  put  the  child  out  of  the  room  away  from  the  painful  sight," 
and  added,  "  this  sympathetic  sensibility  touched  me  deeply." 
The  infant's  agitation  was  certainly  not  owing  to  a  native  gen- 
tleness or  tenderness  of  spirit,  for  M.  Perez  asserts  that  this 
same  child  displayed  toward  cats  the  most  unfeeling  disposi- 
tion. He  admits  that  children  in  general  regard  cats  as  beings 
having  no  rights  which  they  are  bound  to  respect,  nevertheless 
he  considers  the  interest  of  children  in  animals  one  of  their 
most  conspicuous  traits.  "  Dogs,  cats,  sheep,  birds,  chickens," 
he  says,  "  are  all  par  excellence  their  objects  of  recreation, 
instruction  and  affection."  As  an  illustration  of  this  affection- 
ate interest  he  cites  the  case  of  a  child  six  months  old,  which, 
being  left  alone  with  a  turtle,  half  tore  off  one  of  its  feet,  and 
when  the  nurse  arrived  was  pulling  off  another.  This  statement 
certainly  raises  a  strong  presumption  of  affection  for  the  turtle 
on  the  part  of  the  baby,  but  there  is  still  room  for  doubt  as  to 
its  conclusiveness.  The  reptile  employed  in  the  experiment 
was  probably  the  common  land  turtle,  which  is  of  a  dull, 
unsympathetic  nature,  not  likely  to  call  out  the  child's  emo- 
tional feelings.  It  is  therefore  uncertain  whether  the  vivisec- 
tion proceedings  referred  to  were  in  a  loving  or  scientific  spirit. 
In  the  interest  of  science  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  some  infant 
whose  affectionate  disposition  is  in  doubt,  may  be  supplied  with 
a  snapping  turtle  more  likely  to  reciprocate  its  gentle  atten- 
tions. Is  there  not  in  this  audience  some  bachelor  uncle  or 
nervous  inmate  of  a  boarding  house  who  to  settle  the  question 
in  some  such  case  would  be  willing  to  furnish  a  turtle,  pro- 
vided he  or  she  may  also  be  allowed  to  select  the  baby  ? 


—13— 

The  reference  we  have  already  made  to  the  valuable  investi- 
gations of  Kussmauler  into  the  progress  of  infant  develop- 
ment suggests  the  propriety  of  referring  with  more  particu- 
larity to  the  important  discoveries  made  by  himself,  Professor 
Genzmer,  Professor  Preyer  and  other  German  philanthropists 
with  respect  to  baby  sensibilities  and  endurance. 

The  assiduous  course  of  study  and  experiment  pursued  by 
these  energetic  investigators  ranks  them  as  friends  of  the 
infant  race  hardly  surpassed  by  the  good  King  Herod.  For- 
tunately for  science,  two  of  them,  at  least,  Kussmauler  and 
Genzmer,  had  peculiar  facilities  for  pursuing  their  philan- 
thropic inquiries,  being  practitioners  in  a  foundling  hospital. 
Here  they  not  only  found  an  abundance  of  raw  material,  but 
had  no  fear  of  hindrance  by  that  usual  bane  of  scientific  prog- 
ress— an  unscientific  and  excitable  mother  or  nurse  within 
reach  of  their  hair.  Under  these  happy  conditions  it  is  safe 
to  say  that  the  scientific  study  of  infant  intelligence  did  not 
fall  into  innocuous  desuetude  ;  and  few  asylums  ever  contained 
a  greater  number  of  spoiled  children  than  that  in  which  these 
industrious  psychologists,  "  with  ghoulish  glee,"  worked  the 
babies  under  their  charge  for  all  they  were  worth  in  develop- 
ing their  infant  faculties. 

Without  going  too  much  into  the  details  of  each  experiment, 
it  will  be  interesting  and  instructive  to  specify  a  few  of  them 
briefly  with  their  results,  as  a  guide  and  encouragement  to 
future  observers.  One  object  was  to  test  the  development  of 
the  infant's  physical  senses,  and  the  experiments  were  naturally 
directed  to  the  different  organs  by  which  the  several  senses  are 
exercised.  Thus  to  ascertain  the  state  of  the  infant's  eyesight, 
Professor  Preyer  continued  for  several  months  assiduously  to 
brandish  his  hands  and  jerk  his  head  threateningly  toward  his 
child's  face,  and  was  rewarded  by  finding  that  by  these  persua- 
sions the  child  could  in  60  days  be  induced  to  wink,  and  after 
14  weeks  became  so  frightened  that  it  would  throw  up  both 
its  arms.  To  produce  winking,  it  has  been  ascertained  that 
thrusting  the  finger  close  to  the  baby's  eye  is  much  less  effec- 
tive than  the  whole  hand  :  but  poking  the  finger  into  the  eye, 
or  against  the  lid,  never  fails ;  while  suddenly  blowing  into  the 
face  with  a  tube  will,  he  assures  us,  make  it  wink  with  uncom- 
3 


mon  quickness.  At  the  end  of  the  30th  week  a  fine  result  in 
the  way  of  winking  may  also  be  produced  by  rapidly  opening 
and  closing  a  green  fan  at  18  inches  from  the  face.  A  beau- 
tiful squint  may  be  obtained  as  late  as  the  20th  month  by  plac- 
ing the  end  of  the  finger  at  the  tip  of  the  baby's  nose ;  and 
Professor  Preyer  seems  to  have  adopted  this  plan  to  correct  a 
singular  habit  which  his  infant  had  contracted  of  gazing,  at  its 
own  forehead.  Professor  Preyer  also  discovered  that  if,  dur- 
ing the  first  two  days  of  the  infant's  existence,  a  lighted  candle 
is  repeatedly  flourished  close  to  its  eyes  it  will  be  brought 
"into  a  general  state  of  discomfort,"  and  if  "a  very  sensitive 
infant,  will  be  made  to  cry."  Whether  the  Preyer  baby  was  a 
sensitive  infant  or  not  does  not  appear,  but  this  interesting 
experiment  on  its  eyesight  seems  to  have  been  kept  up  till 
the  15th  month,  when  either  partially  blinded  at  last,  or  exas- 
perated beyond  further  endurance,  it  "grasped  the  flame  of 
the  candle  with  its  hands."  This  incident  appears  to  have 
greatly  amused  the  professor,  and  elicits  the  jocose  remark 
that  the  child  "  will  never  do  it  again." 

Not  less  instructive  are  the  researches  made  by  the  different 
investigators  into  the  baby's  sense  of  hearing.  The  question 
whether  new  born  infants  can  hear  or  not  has  been  in  dispute. 
Some  appear  to  hear  more  readily  than  others.  The  best 
method  of  testing  the  child's  capacity  in  any  given  case  is  said 
to  be  shouting,  whistling  and  clapping  the  hands  in  its  ears  for 
the  first  four  weeks.  At  the  end  of  that  period  if  it  does  not 
respond  it  will  be  known  to  be  deaf  and  dumb :  but  whether 
born  so  or  made  so  by  the  experiment  will  always  be  doubtful. 
Kussmauler  made  loud,  discordant  noises  near  the  ears  of  new- 
born children  while  they  were  awake  without  disturbing  them 
much,  but  Feldsbauch  got  better  results  by  clapping  his  hands 
violently  over  them  while  they  were  asleep.  Champney's 
child,  however,  when  sleeping  did  not  succumb  to  this  test, 
and  he  was  forced  to  resort  to  a  hard  slamming  of  the  door  so 
as  to  shake  the  bed.  Genzmer  hammered  a  bell  with  an  iron 
rod  for  24  days  at  different  distances  from  the  ear,  ranging 
from  one  inch  to  20  inches,  in  order  to  set  the  eyelids  to  quiver- 
ing, and  generally  succeeded :  his  toughest  subject  he  says  was 
"  a  very  phlegmatic  child  "  who  held  out  pretty  well  till  the  8th 


—15- 
day,  when  he  gave  symptoms  of  objecting  to  the  rattling  at  five 
inches  from  his  ear.  The  results,  after  trying  this  on  15  chil- 
dren, were  found  to  be  very  uncertain.  Dr.  Moldenhaur 
adopted  what  Professor  Preyer  calls  "  a  much  better  mode  of 
proceeding."  He  made  use  of  a  French  toy  called  "  the  cri- 
cri,  which  gives  a  loud,  brief,  disagreeable  sound  with  dis- 
cordant high  overtones,"  and  held  it  "quite  close  to  the  ear  " 
with  great  success,  as  the  child  invariably  jumped  at  the  first 
trial.  Fifty  children  were  tested,  of  whom  ten  were  less  than 
12  hours  old.  The  results  were  highly  satisfactory.  Eyelids 
quivered,  foreheads  wrinkled,  "then  came  head  movements, 
mostly  single,  short  twistings  of  the  head ;  finally  starting, 
accompanied  by  violent  quivering  of  the  head,  the  arms,  and 
the  upper  part  of  the  body.  Sleeping  children  awoke  and 
screamed."  The  same  inventive  genius,  Dr.  Moldenhaur,  con- 
ceived the  original  idea  of  awakening  the  child's  musical  taste 
by  applying  a  tuning  fork  in  strong  vibration  against  its  head 
as  a  sounding  board ;  but  as  Professor  Preyer  discouragingly 
records,  he  got  no  definite  results,  "  owing  to  the  sensitiveness 
of  the  skin."  Dr.  Deneke,  not  discouraged  by  this  failure, 
procured  a  pair  of  cymbals  and  banged  them  together  close  to 
the  ear  of  an  infant  six  hours  old,  at  which  demonstration  the 
baby  very  sensibly  "  shut  his  eyes  tighter  every  time."  Pro- 
fessor Preyer  in  the  21st  week  of  his  child  beat  a  gong 
before  it  in  order  to  give  it  a  tranquil  expression  while  sitting 
for  its  photograph.  He  reports  as  the  result  that  the  child 
"was  transfixed  with  astonishment ";  a  rigidity  the  more  remark- 
able when  we  consider  the  extraordinary  flexibility  of  its 
organism,  for  he  solemnly  assures  us  that  by  putting  coal 
into  the  stove  behind  the  same  child  it  could  be  made  to  turn 
its  head  around  nearly  180  degrees.  A  little  girl  nine  months 
old  who,  it  is  declared,  "sang  beautifully  to  the  piano,"  was 
treated  to  a  tin  horn  accompaniment  until  she  "  wept  bitterly." 
And  Professor  Preyer,  on  the  25th  day  after  his  child  was 
born,  proudly  records  that  he  startled  it  into  convulsive  fright 
by  standing  before  it  and  suddenly  shouting  "  JAH  !" 

With  respect  to  the  infantile  sense  of  taste,  the  recorded 
experiments  are  not  so  numerous,  but  they  evince  the  same 
commendable  thoroughness  and  ingenuity.  This  branch  of 


inquiry  has  also  some  connection  with  that  relating  to  smell, 
which  we  have  already  remarked  upon.  In  order  to  cultivate 
in  infants  a  correct  judgment  in  matters  of  pure  taste,  Kuss- 
mauler  and  Genzmer  stuffed  into  the  mouths  of  more  than  40 
newly-born  children  different  substances  successively,  including 
salt,  quinine,  tartaric  acid  and  sugar,  and  discovered  that  they 
all  made  "  grimaces  "  at  everything  except  the  sugar.  By  close 
observation  it  was  ascertained  that  the  character  of  these 
"  grimaces  "  differed  in  correspondence  with  the  dose.  There 
was  a  "bitter  grimace"  and  a  " sour  grimace "  and  incipient 
saltatory  movements  when  the  drugs  were  administered,  while 
the  sugar,  after  the  child  discovered  that  it  was  sugar,  produced 
a  "sweet  expression."  Some  other  experiments,  including 
Genzmer's  rubbing  of  petroleum  and  asafoetida  on  the  baby's 
lips,  are  properly  discarded  by  Professor  Freyer  as  incon- 
clusive, since  they  involved  the  sense  of  smell ;  and  he  cor- 
rectly suggests  that  the  proper  method  in  such  cases  is  to 
bandage  the  child's  eyes  and  tightly  hold  its  nose  when  the 
drug  is  introduced ;  since  under  those  circumstances  the 
expression  of  its  countenance,  whether  pleased  or  otherwise, 
will  be  solely  due  to  the  taste  of  the  medicine. 

The  experiments  on  the  infant's  sense  of  touch  or  feeling 
have  been  much  more  varied  and  lively,  but  we  can  only  refer 
to  a  few  of  them.  Professor  Preyer  is  authority  for  the 
singular  fact  that  new-born  children  can  be  made  to  scream 
by  pinching  and  spanking.  Tickling  of  the  nose  produces 
sneezing  and  winking,  and  if  persistently  kept  up,  "move- 
ments of  the  head  and  the  hands,  and  even  tears"  a  remarkable 
precocity,  since  children,  he  says,  "  generally  shed  no  tears  on 
the  first  days  of  life";  but  he  forgets  that  most  children  are 
not  so  fortunate  as  to  have  a  scientific  parentage.  Kussmauler 
and  Genzmer  poked  fingers  into  babies'  eyes,  and  blew  into 
their  faces  and  found  that  the  baby  ordinarily  closed  the  eye 
poked  or  blown  upon.  Following  up  this  curious  discovery, 
it  has  been  found  that  tickling  the  nose  on  the  tip  makes  the 
baby  shut  both  eyes.  Tickling  one  side  makes  it  shut  the  eye 
on  that  side.  Tickling  and  slapping  the  sole  of  its  foot  makes 
it  wiggle  the  leg ;  and  sometimes  both  legs.  Pricking  with 
needles,  if  thoroughly  done,  is  apt  to  make  it  restless  "  after 


two  seconds,  but  a  sound  slapping  is  better  because  then  it  is 
explained  "  the  force  of  the  stimulus  is  exerted  on  a  greater 
number  of  nerve  extremities."  A  very  valuable  discovery 
made  by  Professor  Preyer  is  that  a  screaming  baby  can  be 
instantly  quieted  by  thrusting  a  finger  deeply  into  its  ear. 
This  expedient  answers,  however,  only  for  the  first  six  months  ; 
after  that  it  fails.  Another  strange  fact  stated  by  Professor 
Preyer  is  that  if  a  new-born  child  is  slapped  it  cries  out 
"without  knowing  where  it  was  slapped,  nor  (what  is  more 
probable)  the  cause  of  the  blow ;"  and  he  adds  that  "  it  is  not 
till  the  blows  fall  frequently  on  different  parts  of  the  body 
that  distinctions  of  space  come  gradually  into  the  child's  mind 
as  well  as  sensations  of  pain."  Genzmer  stuck  glass  rods 
down  babies'  throats  to  see  if  they  would  choke,  and  they  did ; 
he  applied  an  ice-cold  iron  rod  to  different  parts  of  their 
bodies  to  make  them  lively,  and  it  did;  but  although  he 
pricked  their  feet,  noses,  upper  lips  and  hands  until  the  blood 
came,  Professor  Preyer  declares  that  they  did  not  respond  "  till 
after  two  days."  He  suggestively  adds  that  if  "  fifty  needle 
pricks  had  been  applied  simultaneously"  there  might  have 
been  a  quicker  response,  and  Kroner  found  in  1882  that  new- 
born babes  could  be  set  to  screaming  and  distorting  their  faces 
by  giving  them  a  strong  electric  shock.  After  this  no  doubt 
remains  that  infants  have  feelings,  whatever  may  be  said  of 
the  philosophers ;  and  we  are  not  surprised  to  learn  that 
Kussmauler  alone  has  noticed  in  young  infants  symptoms  of 
nausea,  or  that  Genzmer  dissents  from  Dr.  Darwin's  dictum 
that  babies  do  not  shed  tears  before  they  are  two  months  old. 
Before  leaving  this  part  of  our  subject  we  must  refer  to 
those  most  interesting  phenomena  of  infant  life,  the  reflex 
movements ;  so  called  because  they  are  made  without  reflec- 
tion. These  curious  movements  were  first  discovered  by 
Taine  in  1870,  and  his  observations  have  since  been  confirmed 
by  later  writers.  Taine  thus  described  them  as  they  were 
exhibited  in  his  own  first-born  progeny.  "  From  the  first, 
probably  by  reflex  action,  this  child  cried  incessantly,  kicked, 
moved  all  its  limbs  and  perhaps  all  its  muscles."  Darwin 
noticed  the  same  peculiarities  in  his  own  first  baby.  "  During 
the  first  seven  days,"  he  says,  "  various  reflex  actions,  namely 


—IB- 
sneezing,  yawning,  stretching,  and  of  course  sucking  and 
screaming,  were  well  performed  by  the  infant."  And  M 
Perez  asserts  that  infants  in  general  make  "  vague  incoherent 
movements  with  their  arms  and  legs,  striking  right  and  left 
without  any  definite  object."  M.  Taine  informs  us  that  he 
succeeded  in  obtaining  an  excellent  display  of  these  move- 
ments by  laying  his  "  subject  on  her  face  on  a  carpet  in  the 
garden,"  and  that  in  this  luxurious  position  "  she  for  hours  at  a 
time  would  work  with  all  her  limbs,  uttering  a  multitude  of 
different  cries  and  exclamations  consisting  exclusively  of  vowel 
sounds."  "This  went  on,"  he  says,. "for  several  months." 
Darwin  improved  on  this  experiment  by  tickling  the  sole  of 
the  infant's  foot,  which  thereupon,  he  says,  "  performed  a  jerk- 
ing movement  accompanied  by  a  curling  of  the  toes";  but 
Preyer  was  unable  to  achieve  a  similar  success  although  he 
industriously  inserted  pins  into  various  parts  of  the  infant's 
person.  It  would  appear  however  that  this  infant  of  Preyer's 
was  a  somewhat  unfavorable  subject  for  the  experiment,  as  he 
had  a  habit  of  biting  his  own  arms,  fingers  and  tongue, 
pounding  hard  objects  against  his  teeth  and  beating  his  own 
head  with  his  fists.  The  Professor  remarks  that  the  child, 
while  thus  thumping  its  own  head,  "  seemed  astonished  at  its 
hardness."  This  suggestion  throws  a  ray  of  light  upon  its 
failure  to  respond  to  the  stimulus  of  the  pins,  for  it  shows  that 
its  actions  were  not  reflex  but  reflective ;  and  it  is  probable 
that  the  pin  experiment  when  carefully  tried  on  a  less  con- 
templative infant  will  be  a  complete  success.  Much  remains 
to  be  learned  as  to  the  cause  and  purposes  of  these  mysterious 
movements,  but  the  following  lucid  explanation  by  a  writer  in 
"  Mind  "  of  certain  complex  movements  of  his  own  infant  and 
its  reasons  therefor,  if  correct,  will  go  far  to  exonerate  the  race 
of  infants  from  the  charge  of  M.  Perez  that  they  move  their 
arms  and  legs  without  any  definite  object.  The  writer  says 
"the  purpose  of  the  flexion  of  the  thighs  on  the  belly  was 
probably  partly  to  relieve  the  tension  of  the  suddenly  con- 
tracted abdominal  muscles ;  but  the  movement  of  the  arms 
(and  partly  those  of  the  legs  also)  probably  had  for  their 
cause  the  necessity  for  relief  by  a  i  nervous  discharge  of  great 
amplitude?  otherwise  called  a  sneeze."  To  clear  up  this  sub- 


—19— 

ject  entirely,  however,  farther  experiments  seem  to  be  neces- 
sary. 

We  are  glad  to  see  that  all  the  students  in  this  infant  school 
of  physiology  appreciate  the  importance  of  investigating  the 
influence  of  hereditary  qualities  on  their  offspring.  By  this 
means  it  may  be  hoped  the  talents  and  virtues  of  the  parents 
as  well  as  the  children  will  be  spread  upon  the  record,  and  this 
will  furnish  a  powerful  incentive  to  make  the  registers  full 
and  truthful.  Dr.  Darwin,  whom  we  should  naturally  expect 
to  take  notice  of  remote  ancestral  traits,  remarks  with  a  par- 
donable complacency  that  the  vocal  performances  of  his 
infant  resembled  those  of  the  anthropoid  apes.  Professor 
Preyer  also  is  struck  with  a  close  similarity  of  his  baby  to  the 
same  species  of  the  Simian  tribe,  and  thus  establishes  a  near 
relationship  between  his  own  family  and  that  of  Dr.  Darwin. 
Numerous  other  points  of  close  resemblance  between  babies 
and  monkeys,  such  as  wrinkling  the  forehead,  grasping  the 
feet  with  the  hands,  shutting  both  eyes  when  sneezing, 
mimicry,  etc.  are  declared  by  these  observers  to  be  common  to 
all  infants.  But  upon  this  delicate  and  dangerous  point  I 
venture  no  opinion.  I  content  myself  with  imitating  the 
prudent  example  of  some  of  our  Biblical  critics,  who  merely 
state  all  the  theories  without  committing  themselves  to  any. 
Doubtless  all  intelligent  mothers  and  grandfathers  will  be  on 
the  alert  to  discover  and  report  new  facts  that  may  throw 
light  on  the  question.  However  this  may  be,  the  view  is  held 
by  all  the  authorities  that  the  very  young  baby  is  an  embodied 
reproduction  of  the  barbaric  ages  of  the  human  race.  A  late 
American  writer  declares  that  every  life  is  a  mere  recapitula- 
tion of  "  man's  ancestral  progress  upwards  from  his  primitive 
savage  condition,"  and  that  "  the  sooner  all  parents  recognise 
the  fact  that  their  infants  are  in  truth  born  savages,  the  better 
it  will  be  for  those  infants."  By  close  observation  of  the  baby, 
therefore,  as  materialized  history,  many  new  facts  have  been  as- 
certained respecting  the  habits  of  primeval  man.  Thus  Pro- 
fessor Preyer  informs  us  that  the  starting  of  babies  a  few  days 
old  at  a  sudden  sound,  is  a  relic  of  the  frights  of  their  barbarian 
ancestors.  The  custom  generally  observed  by  new-born  babies 
of  lying  on  their  backs,  and  at  a  later  period  of  creeping  or 
rolling  as  a  means  of  locomotion,  is,  it  appears,  an  exact  repro- 


— 2O — 


duction  of  similar  practices  on  the  part  of  pre-historic  men 
before  they  invented  the  Jess  convenient  and  agreeable  habits 
of  standing  and  walking.  These  latter  accomplishments  in 
fact,  it  is  now  found,  are  not  natural  to  human  beings,  for  as 
Professor  Preyer  declares,  "  it  is  merely  the  advantage  which 
the  upright  position  affords  in  the  universal  competition  of 
living  beings  with  each  other,  which  long  ago  made  that  posi- 
tion habitual  and  hereditary."  An  English  youth  four  days  old, 
named  Clifford,  "  grasped  his  father's  forefinger  and  made  an 
abortive  effort  to  carry  it  to  his  mouth,"  and  thus  afforded 
incontestable  proof  of  the  "survival  of  a  deeply-organized 
cannibal  instinct."  From  the  circumstance  that  in  this  youth 
"  crying  of  the  really  miserable  sort  took  place  before  smiling 
or  even  cooing,"  the  same  reflective  parent  deduces  the  dis- 
covery that  "  in  the  history  of  the  human  race  the  need  of  mak- 
ing known  pains  and  wants  was  the  more  urgent  and  so  was 
the  first  one  to  be  satisfied." 

At  the  end  of  the  eighth  week  young  Clifford  "  showed  his 
first  traceable  germs  of  sympathy  "  by  cooing  when  coaxed, 
but  these  sympathetic  expressions  soon  gave  way  to  "  scolding 
noises";  very  fortunately  for  the  cause  of  chronological 
science,  since  thus  was  revealed  the  "  period  in  human  history 
when  men  began  to  exercise  power  and  coercion  over  one 
another."  The  same  historical  authority,  Clifford,  Jr.,  by  gazing 
at  the  face  of  a  clock,  and  at  the  flickering  of  a  fire-flame,  dis- 
closed "  the  primitive  feeling  respecting  the  second  selves,  or 
the  ghosts  of  things,"  and  by  "shrieking  at  an  ugly  doll,  and 
kicking  at  the  sight  of  strangers,"  made  known  "  the  countless 
experiences  of  peril  which  the  race  endured  when  in  its  pre- 
social  Ishmaelitic  condition."  Not  to  be  outdone  in  prehistoric 
discovery,  Dr.  Darwin's  boy  ran  away  at  sight  of  an  ele- 
phant in  the  Zoological  gardens,  and  thus  proved  to  a  dem- 
onstration that  elephants  formerly  lived  in  Great  Britain  and 
terrified  the  monkeys. 

It  must  be  confessed  in  connection  with  this  subject  of 
heredity,  that  while  the  writers  on  infant  psychology  have 
shown  so  deep  an  interest  in  tracing  back  the  ancestral  traits 
of  their  offspring  to  the  days  of  primeval  man,  they  seem  to 
be  generally  somewhat  reserved  about  making  deductions 
connected  with  the  mental  and  moral  qualities  of  the  babies' 


— 21 — 

more  immediate  parentage.  This  is  the  more  remarkable 
since  with  respect  to  physical  characteristics  they  show  by  no 
means  the  same  reticence.  Indeed  some  of  them  incline  to  the 
view  that  even  a  high  respect  on  the  part  of  the  parent  toward 
some  distinguished  individual,  without  any  relationship,  may 
cause  the  infant  to  exhibit  in  a  singular  degree  some  personal 
peculiarity  of  such  individual.  Thus  a  college  professor  in 
Massachusetts  writes  with  great  pride  that  his  baby  bears  an 
astonishing  resemblance  to  Agassiz  with  respect  to  baldness 
and  hopes  that  the  likeness  may  ever  continue.  But  it  is  with 
mental  qualities  that  we  are  now  concerned,  and  with  regard 
to  these  it  seems  to  be  unanimously  agreed  by  all  the  authori- 
ties that  all  those  which  are  disagreeable  or  disreputable  are 
derived  from  remote  barbarian  ancestors ;  it  necessarily 
follows  therefore  that  the  opposite  traits  are  inherited  from 
the  nearest  progenitors ;  and  this  may  account  for  the  very 
modest  and  limited  reference  made  by  the  different  writers  to 
their  infants'  virtues. 

This  brings  us  to  an  important  and  most  interesting  part  of 
our  subject ;  that  which  relates  to  the  moral  development  of 
infants ;  but  it  is  not  desirable,  if  it  were  possible,  to  dwell 
long  on  this  branch  of  inquiry.  Since  the  doctrines  of  total 
depravity  and  original  sin  were  given  up,  it  has  been  generally 
agreed  that  infants  have  come  directly  from  Heaven  and  as 
cherubs  without  wings  afford  the  nearest  representation  pos- 
sible of  the  celestial  inhabitants.  The  recorded  observations 
throw  a  strong  light  on  this  attractive  theory  and  clearly  show 
that  the  moral  sentiments  of  infants  are  as  numerous  and  as 
lively  as — as  snakes  in  Ireland.  The  lamentable  conclusion  of 
all  the  authorities  is  that  the  less  said  on  the  subject  the  better 
for  the  feeling  of  all  parties  especially  in  view  of  the  doctrine 
of  heredity.  As  one  writer  expresses  it,  "  From  two  to  four 
years  of  age  children  are  transparent  egotists,  very  self 
conscious  and  almost  destitute  of  moral  sense.  Their  parents 
are  their  moral  law  ";  and  then  follows  the  natural  inference, 
"  Even  at  five  years  of  age  their  standard  of  morality  is  not 
high  and  is  liable  to  frequent  and  serious  relapses." 

After  so  candid  a  preface  we  are  not  much  surprised  to  find 
this  same  writer  summing  up  the  entire  character  of  his  own 
baby  at  the  age  of  twelve  to  fifteen  months  in  the  following 


— 22 — 

catalogue  of  its  virtues :  "  Self  consciousness,  egotism,  cre- 
dulity, impulsiveness,  irascibility,  jealousy,  cruelty,  obstinacy, 
cunning  and  dissimulation."  No  doubt  the  parent  of  a  child 
which  has  inherited  so  many  vigorous  traits  of  character  is 
entitled  to  respect  if  not  to  envy,  but  when  he  adds  that  "  the 
virtue  of  truthfulness  must  be  enforced  at  the  age  of  twelve 
to  fifteen  months,  even  with  a  switch,"  we  can  only  agree 
with  him  to  the  extent  that  the  switch  should  be  applied  to 
that  ancestor  most  nearly  responsible  for  the  child's  moral 
obliquities. 

We  have  taken  up  so  much  time  with  other  branches  of 
study  in  the  infant  school  of  psychology  that  we  have  but 
little  left  for  one  of  the  most  important  of  all,  the  department 
of  philology.  In  all  the  published  papers  the  writers  expand 
with  enthusiasm  over  the  achievements  of  the  infant  intellect 
in  this  department.  Dr.  Darwin  proudly  declares  of  his  child 
that  when  five  months  and  a  half  old,  he  uttered  an  articulate 
sound  "da,"  but  without  any  meaning  attached  to  it.  M. 
Taine  remarks  in  a  more  general  way  and  with  indisputable 
truth  that  "  in  infants,  the  vocal  organ  acquires  dexterity  just 
as  the  limbs  do  by  constant  efforts."  According  to  an  English 
writer  (Mr.  Champneys),  this  dexterity  of  the  vocal  organ  was 
carried  by  his  infant  to  a  very  high  degree.  "  The  sound,"  he 
says,  in  endeavoring  to  explain  a  very  extraordinary  howl 
peculiar  to  this  baby,  "  must  have  been  produced  by  closing  the 
fauces  by  the  contact  of  the  pillars  of  the  fauces  and  the  soft 
palate  so  as  to  send  all  the  sound  through  the  nose  ;  the  vowel 
sound  being  then  produced  by  separating  the  soft  palate  and 
pillars  of  the  fauces  and  allowing  the  sound  to  come  through 
the  mouth"  That  this  complicated  maneuvering  of  the  vocal 
organs  must  have  produced  an  appalling  effect  is  unquestion- 
able. These  however  are  but  rudimentary  exercises  on  the 
part  of  the  infant,  designed  by  a  beneficent  providence  to 
qualify  him  for  a  higher  stage,  both  of  science  and  art.  Some 
observers,  notably  MM.  Taine  and  Egger,  assert  that  the 
infant  intellect  after  a  very  early  period  devotes  itself  with 
the  industry  of  a  lexicographer  to  the  formation  of  vocabu- 
laries. As  M.  Taine  expresses  it,  "  several  vocabularies  may 
succeed  each  other  in  its  mind  by  the  obliteration  of  old 
words  replaced  by  new  ones."  "  The  child,"  he  adds,  "  is  an 


—23— 

original  genius.  If  there  existed  no  language  it  would  dis- 
cover one  or  find  an  equivalent."  This  rosy  view,  however, 
is  not  sustained  by  more  careful  writers ;  Professor  Preyer,  who 
has  an  entire  volume  devoted  to  the  subject,  declares  that  his 
infant  at  the  age  of  three  years  had  not  invented  a  word. 
But  it  must  be  recollected  that  this  child  had  a  head  of 
astonishing  hardness,  and  it  is  not  unlikely  that  he  was  excep- 
tionally stupid  in  the  matter  of  language.  Certain  it  is  that 
by  some  common  instinct,  or  other  intellectual  tendency,  the 
infants  on  record  of  all  nationalities  have  formed  their  first 
language  on  the  same  principle,  that  of  syllabic  repetition,  and 
that  up  to  a  certain  point  they  nearly  all  have  a  common 
vocabulary.  It  must  be  admitted  that  this  vocabulary  is  not 
very  extensive,  consisting  apparently  of  only  four  words, 
simple  but  expressive,  ma-ma,  pa-pa,  be-be,  ti-tL  To  this 
list  there  should  perhaps  be  added  wa-wa  for  "  dog,"  though 
M.  Taine  seems  to  have  lost  faith  in  this  word  as  an  appella- 
tion confined  to  the  canine  race  in  consequence  of  his  infant 
informing  some  guests  at  dinner  that  the  roast  mutton  was 
" wa-wa"  Similar  questions  more  or  less  difficult  seem  likely 
to  arise  with  regard  to  other  words  owing  to  a  want  of  uni- 
formity among  infant  linguists  of  different  nationalities. 
Thus  for  a  generic  word  signifying  a  wish  for  something  to 
eat,  it  appears  that  English  and  German  babies  have  adopted 
the  syllable  "  mum."  The  French  baby  however  calls  ener- 
getically for  "  ham"  Which  shall  prevail  in  general  use  ?  As 
the  majority  of  infants  clearly  favor  the  former  expression  we 
are  inclined  to  decide  that  "  mum's  the  word,"  though  in  a 
philosophic  point  of  view  "  ham "  is  more  truly  Baconian. 
But  such  technical  questions  are  too  abstruse  for  discussion 
before  a  promiscuous  audience  and  must  be  referred  for  settle- 
ment to  the  next  baby  show  or  other  symposium  of  deeply  red 
philologists  if  a  lexicon  is  to  be  constructed  from  the 
languages  of  Babel.  Before  leaving  this  subject,  however, 
we  must  express  our  dissent  from  a  suggestion  which  Dr. 
Darwin  makes  in  connection  with  it.  That  distinguished 
philosopher,  fired  with  enthusiasm  over  the  discovery  that  "  the 
anthropoid  ape  utters  notes  in  a  true  musical  scale,"  requests 
parents  to  ascertain  whether  "there  is  any  uniformity  in 
different  children  in  the  pitch  of  their  voices  under  various 


—24— 

frames  of  mind"  This  we  think  is  asking  too  much.  The 
Doctor's  family  pride  carries  him  too  far.  It  cannot  be 
expected  that  mothers  in  general  will  feel  so  much  interest  in 
the  Darwinian  family  tree,  that  they  will  provide  phonographs 
and  tuning  forks  as  essential  parts  of  nursery  furniture,  and 
then  keep  nagging  their  babies  into  "different  frames  of  mind," 
in  order  to  ascertain  the  keys  on  which  Dr.  Darwin's  hylobate 
forefathers  pitched  their  screeches.  "We  are  glad  to  see  there- 
fore that  this  request  is  wholly  ignored  in  the  registers. 

From  the  dry  and  abstract  review  thus  given  of  the  achieve- 
ments already  accomplished  by  science  in  this  new  branch  of 
human  development,  the  imagination  can  easily  soar  onward 
and  upward  to  its  future  triumphs.  When  the  coming 
intelligent  woman  shall  have  properly  fired  the  parental  heart 
in  every  town,  the  fifth  great  act  in  the  drama  of  human 
progress  will  have  opened.  The  registers  will  go  like  la 
grippe  into  every  house.  Mothers,  sisters,  aunts,  grandfathers 
of  course,  possibly  even  fathers,  will  engage  in  the  scientific 
study  of  infant  intelligence,  and  the  merits  of  the  newly-born 
generations  will  be  rolled  into  the  fold  of  a  permanent  record 
with  as  much  precision  and  certainty  as  we  used  to  operate 
last  year's  puzzle  of  u  The  little  pigs  in  clover."  Every  properly 
constituted  University  and  every  Scientific  Association  will 
have  its  cradle  of  science  and  its  baby  chair  of  philosophy. 
Under  the  stimulus  of  registration  also,  a  vast  improvement 
may  be  hoped  for  in  the  quality  of  the  registered  article. 
In  short,  it  is  not  too  much  to  predict  that  when  registration 
shall  have  produced  its  full  effects,  the  millenium  itself  will 
have  begun,  and  its  prophetic  scenes  will  be  realized.  For 
when  the  wise  baby  no  longer  fills  his  belly  with  the  east 
wind,  but  is  stuffed  with  facts,  principles,  and  logical  deduc- 
tions ;  in  short  when  the  child  is  born  a  hundred  years  old, 
then  the  judicious  lion  looking  for  a  breakfast  will  undoubt- 
edly prefer  to  lie  down  with  a  lamb,  or  even  to  eat  straw 
like  an  ox !  Then,  the  infant,  tough,  leathery  and  juiceless, 
will  repel  the  appetite  of  even  the  reptile  tribes ;  so  that  then 
the  sucking  child  shall  be  able  to  play  safely  on  the  hole  of 
the  asp  and  the  weaned  child  to  lay  his  hand  without  clanger 
on  the  cockatrice's  den. 


APPENDIX— MARCH,  1902 


It  is  gratifying  to  record  that  since  the  foregoing  lecture  was  delivered, 
the  sought-for  Intelligent  Woman  has  come  to  the  front,  not  as  a  single 
individual  but  as  an  army  with  banners  and  infantry,  to  maintain  the 
just  rights  of  babyhood,  and  has  kindled  an  interest  not  merely 
throughout  an  entire  town,  but  through  whole  continents,  and  even 
among  the  distant  Isles  of  the  Orient.  A  leading  scientific  journal  in- 
forms us  (June,  1900)  that  "Child-study  has  recently  become  a  most 
active  department  of  psychology.  It  is  the  serious  pursuit  of  men  of 
science  and  the  fad  of  women's  clubs.  A  late  accession  to  the  magazines 
devoted  to  it  comes  from  Japan."  And  we  are  proud  to  know  from 
another  journal  that  "In  America  more  has  been  done  to  study  the 
child  than  in  all  the  rest  of  the  world,  and  the  work  has  as  yet  only 
begun." 

It  is  pleasing  also  to  note  that  the  study  has  begun  to  advance  from  the 
mere  observation  of  phenomena  to  that  of  training  the  infant's  faculties 
for  future  use.  Some  of  the  recorded  experiments  in  this  direction  seem 
worthy  to  be  mentioned.  A  scientist  in  Washington,  D.  C.,  we  are 
informed,  "commenced  the  training  of  his  child  two  years  before  it 
was  born."  This  remarkable  achievement  was  accomplished  by  the  use 
of  guinea  pigs  as  proxies  for  the  prospective  child  to  determine  in 
advance  its  probable  mental  and  moral  endowments  and  its  physical 
capacities  of  endurance.  These  having  been  satisfactorily  ascertained 
and  the  baby  born,  the  infant  soon  after  its  birth  was  daily  plunged  into 
tubs  of  water  of  different  temperatures  in  order  "  to  store  his  brain  with 
memories  of  all  the  degrees  of  heat  and  cold  which  any  one  is  likely  to 
encounter  in  the  course  of  his  life."  Disks  of  various  colors  were  fre- 
quently whirled  before  its  eyes  by  an  electrical  machine  "as  the  best 
possible  foundation  for  an  artistic  education."  Whistles  of  different 
pitches  were  sounded  in  the  ears  to  develop  its  musical  taste.  Fifteen 
hundred  phials  containing  as  many  different  smells  were  successively 
applied  at  regular  intervals  to  its  nose  "to  build  up  the  necessary  smell 
memories  and  to  teach  him  great  acuteness  in  discriminating  odor  from 
odor."  By  a  similar  method  its  sense  of  taste  was  cultivated  by  poking 
straws  into  its  mouth  ' '  which  had  been  previously  dipped  in  various 
substances."  So  successful  has  been  this  training  that  we  are  told  "  the 
child  at  sixteen  months  old  can  distinguish  about  fifty  different  tastes 
and  thirty  different  smells,"  but  by  what  indications  it  individualized 
each  of  these  tastes  and  smells  we  are  unfortunately  not  informed. 

We  are  not  surprised  to  hear  that  this  child  at  sixteen  months  old 
"  had  a  head  unusually  developed  for  an  infant  of  its  size,"  and  might 


—26— 

have  fears  that  its  intellect  was  being  trained  disproportionately  to  its 
body  ;  but  we  are  happily  relieved  upon  this  point  by  learning  that  abun- 
dant physical  exercise  was  provided,  albeit  of  a  rather  constrained  and 
involuntary  sort.  To  be  more  specific  we  quote  verbatim  :  "  That  all  of 
the  brain  cells  governing  his  muscular  sense  will  be  fully  developed  this 
baby  must  have  every  one  of  the  many  muscles  of  his  tender  body 
moved  systematically  and  at  regular  intervals.  During  this  exercise  the 
father  keeps  before  him  a  manikin  showing  the  position  and  direction 
of  each  muscle.  At  first  the  infantile  limbs,  head  and  body  were  moved 
in  different  directions  by  the  father's  hands  until  the  memories  of  the 
muscular  feelings  were  mentally  enregistered."  ''No  single  muscle  in 
the  child's  entire  muscular  system  is  neglected  by  this  action  contrived  to 
combine  mental  memories  of  motion,  speed  and  direction  in  his  brain." 

We  are  further  informed  and  can  easily  believe  that  ' '  all  of  this  odd 
training  is  as  thoroughly  enjoyed  by  the  infant  as  the  ordinary  romps  of 
children."  It  must  indeed  be  an  unreasonable  baby  which  would  not 
rejoice  to  identify  each  muscle  as  it  is  pulled,  wrenched  or  twisted  with 
its  representative  in  the  manikin  before  him,  and  to  mentally  enregister 
its  position  and  direction.  For  to  use  the  words  of  an  eminent  professor 
of  psychology  in  a  recent  work,  "  How  can  the  sensitive  soul  of  the  child 
fail  to  be  allured  into  an  improvement  of  the  opportunity  to  grasp  the 
simple  but  important  fact  that  A  Aj  A2  A8,  etc.,  although  successive  in 
time  are  similar  states  of  consciousness  as  respects  the  content  of  sensa- 
tion, the  tone  of  feeling  evoked,  and  the  motor  activities  engaged?" 

It  is  impossible  in  this  brief  note  to  refer  to  all  the  valuable  contribu- 
tions which  American  workers  have  made  to  the  science  of  child- 
study,  but  it  would  be  unpardonable  not  to  mention  some  of  their  labors 
in  the  department  of  moral  training.  Among  the  more  interesting  of 
these  are  the  investigations  made  by  a  western  professor  into  the  most 
convenient  and  effectual  methods  of  child-punishment.  This  inquirer 
has  issued  blank  registers  in  which  parents  may  record  all  the  offenses 
which  their  children  commit,  the  kind  of  punishment  administered  in 
each  case  and  the  effect  thereof.  By  this  means  it  will  be  possible,  after 
a  great  body  of  statistics  have  been  collected,  to  determine  the  com- 
parative advantages  of  the  following  and  other  forms  of  retribution, 
viz :  Spanking,  slapping,  ear  cuffing,  birching,  strapping,  closet  in- 
carceration, banishment  to  bed,  &c.,  &c.  Lest  the  child  should  fail 
normally  to  afford  sufficient  opportunity  for  experiments  in  all  these 
methods,  the  professor  suggests  the  expedient  of  nagging  it  by  arbitrary, 
unreasonable  and  senseless  commands  which  may  incite  it  to  rebellion. 
In  order  to  promote  respect  for  parental  authority,  he  recommends  that 
fictitious  stories  of  gross  injustice  by  parents  towaud  their  children  be 
related  to  the  child  with  the  request  for  its  opinion  on  the  case.  In 
California  this  idea  has  been  somewhat  varied  and  amplified  with  inter- 
esting results.  By  prearrangement  several  hundreds  of  teachers  read 
to  their  school  children  a  story  how  Jennie  painted  the  parlor  chairs 
with  her  new  box  of  paints  in  order  to  make  them  look  pretty  and  to 
please  mama.  The  question  was  then  submitted,  "If  you  had  been  her 


—27— 

mother  what  would  you  have  said  or  done  to  Jennie  ?"  Three  thousand 
answers,  we  are  told,  were  written  out  by  boys  and  girls  ranging  from 
six  to  eleven  years  of  age.  Of  the  six-year-olds  1,536  girls  and  1,770 
boys  voted  that  Jennie  should  be  whipped.  Of  the  eleven-year-olds  855 
girls  and  1,434  boys  voted  the  same  way,  though  the  majority  thought 
justice  would  be  satisfied  if  Jennie  should  be  sent  to  bed,  or  lose  her 
paints.  Of  the  rest  of  the  children  22S  thought  it  would  be  sufficient 
to  make  Jennie  promise  not  to  do  so  again.  The  great  value  of  this 
effort  to  obtain  infant  views  in  ethics  and  penology  is  somewhat  im- 
paired by  the  fact  that  while  only  3,000  answers  were  sent  in,  the  votes 
as  above  classified  amount  to  5,823.  So  that  we  are  left  in  doubt  what 
the  verdict  actually  was  and  in  gloomy  uncertainty  what  ought  to  be 
done  in  the  not  unlikely  case  that  numerous  susceptible  children,  inspired 
by  the  celebrity  that  Jennie  obtained,  will  imitate  her  artistic  achieve- 
ment. 

Without  pursuing  the  subject  further,  enough  has  been  said  to  show 
that  20th  century  babies  will  enter  on  life  with  more  brilliant  prospects 
than  their  predecessors  for  distinguished  careers.  And  it  may  be  further 
assumed  that  if  many  of  them  do  not  ultimately  occupy  places  in  vari- 
ous public  institutions,  including  sanitariums,  insane  asylums  and  peni- 
tentiaries, it  will  not  be  the  fault  of  the  early  training  they  will  have 
received  at  the  hands  of  enthusiastic  votaries  of  child-study  according 
to  methods  recommended  by  experts  in  that  noble  branch  of  humani- 
tarian philosophy. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 
LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


STACKS 

1  9  1958 


17Apr'5SAJ 


er?O  CD 


201989    1 


W 


LD  21A-50m-8,'57 
(C8481sl£») 


m 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


